What is the characteristic of a ping-pong virus?

A ping-pong virus is characterized by its behavior of replication without causing significant harm, making it a type of benign or harmless virus. It often infects files and can continually copy itself to other areas or systems, much like a ping-pong ball bouncing back and forth. This replication process can lead to increased resource consumption on the infected system, but the virus itself does not typically have destructive capabilities. Understanding this characteristic is crucial when discussing how different types of malware operate and the potential impact they may have on computer systems and networks. Recognizing the nature of a ping-pong virus helps in formulating appropriate detection and mitigation strategies that focus on containment rather than removal of harmful data or files.